To diagnosis and treatment of diseases, of very importance are analysis of body fluid such as blood and intercellular fluid of a human body, in particular, detection of the existence of a specific substance in the body fluid or measurement of the contents of substrates contained in the body fluid such as glucose, cholesterol and lactic acid. Here, as an example of the body fluid analysis, explanation is given of measurement of a glucose concentration in blood (hereinafter referred to as a “blood glucose level”).
Self-control of the blood glucose level is important for treatment of diabetes. Therefore, a patient of diabetes needs to conduct frequent measurement of his/her blood glucose level to maintain the blood glucose level within a normal range. When the patient measures his/her blood glucose level by himself/herself, the blood glucose level measurement is performed by the following steps.
1) A disposable puncture needle is loaded in advance into a puncture instrument such as a lancet and a disposable biosensor is loaded into a measuring instrument.
2) The puncture instrument is held in a dominant hand and a tip of the puncture instrument is pressed against an arm or a finger of the other hand, and then a puncture needle is protruded to allow blood to ooze out.
3) A measuring instrument is held in the dominant hand in place of the puncture instrument.
4) A body fluid supply part of the biosensor loaded in the measuring instrument is brought into contact with a body part from which blood is allowed to ooze to supply the blood into the biosensor, then the measurement results are waited for.
In this way, the puncture instrument must be replaced with the measuring instrument during the measurement, which is troublesome. Further, if it takes a long time until the blood is supplied to the biosensor after the blood is allowed to ooze, the blood may be dried to deteriorate measurement accuracy.
Under the circumstances, there has been proposed an integrated measuring device in which the puncture instrument and the measuring instrument are united to allow blood collection and measurement. Such an integrated measurement device is sold by Dinabbott under the name of “Sof-Tact”, for example.
However, regarding an integrated measuring device of this kind, the puncture needle is held in the device and hence it is difficult to know exactly where the puncture needle protrudes. Therefore, the position to be pricked by the puncture needle cannot be fine adjusted and an area where the blood is allowed to ooze is restricted to relatively large body parts such as arms, which makes blood collection difficult in small parts such as fingertips. There are also problems in that the blood supply to the biosensor cannot be visually checked and the device is large to cause inconvenience in carrying it.
The integrated measuring device conducts the measurement by a succession of operations. Therefore, if a problem occurs in the puncture operation or the blood supply to the sensor, both of the puncture needle and the sensor need to be replaced, which increases the cost. Further, in view of the infection via blood adhered thereto, it is impossible to share the measuring device among many patients at the bedside in an inpatient ward or a diagnosis field.
In view of the above, an object of the present invention is to provide an adaptor for measurement that allows a user to conduct easy and speedy measurement even if a puncture instrument and a measuring instrument are separated.
Further, an object of the present invention is to provide a body fluid measuring instrument attached with a puncture instrument that allows easy and speedy measurement.